Sipping Time

Following a shared trip to Warsaw, Sipping Time is back to discuss the history of Poland’s resilient capital. Nicknamed the ‘Phoenix City’, Warsaw has had an extremely turbulent past - with resoundingly high highs and devastatingly low lows. 

We unpack some of the stories that led to this reputation, seeking to understand the historical contexts of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Swedish and Russian wars, and the fascinating rebuilding of the city after the Second World War. 

We also recount the trip itself - with our whisky-infused amblings around the city, and our impressions, as a frequent visitor, and a first-time comer. 

We also dive headfirst into the thrilling story of Sigismund III Vasa, the depicted king upon the Column of Sigismund (Kolumna Zygmunta) in the Old Town. A story of bloody familial betrayals, tremulously vast wars, and ridiculously shaky imposter-tsars… this story has all the makings of an epic film series.

For suggestions, comments, or just to say hi, our email is sippingtimepodcast@gmail.com 

Our twitter is: https://twitter.com/Sipping_Time 

And our Instagram is: https://www.instagram.com/sippingtimepodcast/ 

Please give us a follow if you enjoy the show! 

Hosts: Adrian Cathie and Sami Pontin 

Editing and Design: Adrian Cathie

Escape rooms - a new and exciting type of game, based on playful exploration and problem-solving, where players are thrown into locked rooms and dared to escape! Sometimes quite literally. It's very possible that you yourself have been to one, or even a few. We jump into the topic alongside a guest, Mairi Nolan, a passionate escape room afficionado with an extremely impressive amount of completed rooms under her belt. 

We discuss the concept of escape rooms, the history, and various themes along the way. As customary, we also veer into random potholes of history, among others discussing daring (and not-so-daring) escapes throughout history, such as Charles I, Roger Mortimer, and Ranulph Flambard (the first prisoner and escapee of the Tower of London). We also engage in a deeply thorough discussion of which historical figures we'd like to have on our team in an escape room!

We hope you enjoy! Thanks again to our guest, Mairi Nolan, for jumping on this episode with us - her social media handle is @mairispaceship and her website is https://www.mairispaceship.com/

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For suggestions, comments, or just to say hi, our email is sippingtimepodcast@gmail.com

Our twitter is: https://twitter.com/Sipping_Time

And our Instagram is: https://www.instagram.com/sippingtimepodcast/

Please give us a follow if you enjoy the show!

Hosts: Adrian Cathie and Sami Pontin

Editing and Design: Adrian Cathie

Most people will have heard of Napoleon Bonaparte - Emperor of France and one history's most famous Great Men. Much less famous is the life of his only son and heir, Napoleon François Joseph Charles Bonaparte; Napoleon II.

Nicknamed 'L'Aiglon' ('The Eaglet'), Napoleon II's story is punctuated by its briefness. Reminiscent of Phaeton, son of Helios, who was burned entering the atmosphere in his father's chariot - Napoleon II was scorched by the consequences of his father's glory. Isolated and concealed within the walls of Austrian palaces, protected from both personal and political assassinations, and forbidden from satiating his grand military ambitions with a rapidly failing body. To quote his physician, 'an iron spirit in a body of crystal'.

For two die-hard Napoleon nerds, this was a true test of self-control. We dash through the highlights of the father's life, discuss the socio-political climate in Europe, and get onto the story of the titular character himself. We also embark on multiple tangent throughout, as well as a historiographically-minded attempt at some alternate history. Could have the Bonapartes been the new Habsburgs? (Apologies Sami; he'll hate that point)

Empire - an abstract hyperobject that defies human measurement, and yet an aspect of history that has been felt very intimately and tangibly throughout time. We dive into this exploration of the meaning and purpose of empire, using the examples of the Byzantine and Ottoman Empires. How and why did they fall? What can we learn from this? And what silly stories can we tell along the way?

Brace yourself for tales of West Side Story-esque street gangs in the streets of Constantinople, the delicious intricacies of Ottoman taxation policy, and gruesome family fueds. It's a long one, and it's a dense one, so pack an extra glass of whisky for the ride.

For this episode we also have a guest! A good friend of ours, Jonas. He has fantastic insight to offer as we scrutinise these topics, with an especially astute understanding of modern geopolitical history.

We hope you enjoy! For suggestions, comments, or notes, hit us up on sippingtime@gmail.com

This time we're diving deep into the history of the Battleship Yamato - the heaviest and most powerfully armed battleship ever constructed.

We provide ample historical context (as always), including Japanese Isolationism, the Meiji Restoration, and the Russo-Japanese War. We look at how these movements modernised Japan in an incredibly short span of time, and how this developed aesthetically too.

We also look at how curry came to Japan, examine the fascinating life of Tsuguharu Foujita, and discuss in depth the final mission of the Yamato, Operation Ten-Go, which led to it's ultimate tragic demise.

We hope you enjoy this episode, where we've aimed to squeeze density into a narrow subject, aiming to truly 'sip time'. 

The final episode in our three-part series on the history of arches! We continue to cover plenty of ground (probably too many!), as we span another thousand years. We then gracefully spare our precious listeners from a further seven parts, ending it at the beginnings of the renaissance, neatly tying everything together with a throwback to some earlier examples. 

We pick up where we left off with early Islamic and Middle-Eastern architecture, continuing to look at how arches rapidly grew in complexity and style, with examples in Turkey, Spain, and Syria (among others), as their presence signified deep religious meaning. We then look at how interesting syncretism arose in the central mediterranean, namely Sicily, which was afflicted with a lesser-known Norman invasion, giving way to the fascinating Norman-Arab-Byzantine architecture. We then rather expectedly rip our way through western Christian architecture, making our way through Romanesque into the trecherously intoxicating waters of the Gothic, where it took us every ounce of self-restraint to keep from running long. 

Along the way we entertain a whole host of random tangents, as per usual, and end with our thoroughly-intoxicated aftershow, where we discuss the crazy story of the Abbasid Revolution, a story heavily influencial on Game of Thrones' Red Wedding, and bad jokes on the theme of Gothic.

Part two of our epic three-part series on the history of arches! 

We continue to delve deeper into the history and application of arches through time - starting with where we last left off, the inception of Christian architecture in Rome, then travelling east where we gush over Byzantine and Hellenistic architecture, as well as fascinating examples from the Parthian empire, Ptolemaic Egypt, and plenty more.

We also include here our aftershow where we get lost in the sauce discussing the story of Sir Francis Drake's fascinating drama with a witch aboard his ship while on his mighty voyage, the joys of stag-do's and finding common ground in similarly niche obsessions, and we get into a tipsy debate about the use of culturally specific architecture to represent a country's governmental buildings. 

Apologies in advance for the audio quality in this episode - we're still finding our footing with this audio business. Next episode, and all episodes going forward, will be of much higher quality. Enjoy!

The first episode of our epic three-part series on the history of arches! Far from merely sipping, we're chugging down history in this episode, driving our way through thousands of years of history, touching on different cultures and approaches to architecture. 

The humble arch - a powerful and mathematically beautiful creation, able to withstand immense amounts of pressure as well as adding depth and variety in our treatment of space - It seems to defy gravity, offering us a secure rounded void within a physical structure.

We examine how cultures explored this idea, looking back to Mesopotamia, Mycenea and Kusinagara , among others. Applications varied from traversable waterways underground, to elaborate rock-cut caves aboveground. We then move along into the depths of Greek and Roman applications of the arch - how the Greeks seemed somewhat uninterested, versus the Romans who couldn't keep themselves from it!

We also get somewhat lost in our rabbitholes along the way - we learn about the twisted and hilarious story of Atreus, with the family dynamics rivaling the most crazy of Eastenders' storylines.  We rip through a concise and deep history of the Sassanid empire, as it grows and rivals Rome in strength and scale. We also discuss the strange intricacies of Walpole's 'Castle of Otranto', among plenty more!

This is a longer episode than our first, we're experimenting with episode length so please do let us know how you feel about the longer format. Enjoy!

British food - a concept ridiculed across the globe for its blandness and lack of ingenuity. Being two Brits, and not completely in disagreement with the reputation, we dive into how this has come about, whether the reputation is accurate, and if things could've ever been different. 

How has the 'english breakfast' come about, and is it technically a mezze? How much is a 'quart', and is one instance of it in wine, and another in beer, acceptable as a substitute for your morning coffee? And what the hell is a 'potted pigeon'?

This episode features the full show plus the addended 'after-show' where we loosen up and chat about anything we missed... and beyond. Enjoy!